thoughts and is going to help me. Anyway I must take a look at the sky
and make sure."

So she jumped up and ran through the passage to the outer entrance, and
they all followed after her and grouped themselves on a ledge of the
mountain-side. Sure enough, dark clouds had filled the sky and a slow,
drizzling rain had set in.

"It can't last for long," said Shaggy, looking upward, "and when it
stops we shall lose the sweet little fairy we have learned to love.
Alas," he continued, after a moment, "the clouds are already breaking
in the west, and--see!--isn't that the Rainbow coming?"

Betsy didn't look at the sky; she looked at Polychrome, whose happy,
smiling face surely foretold the coming of her father to take her to
the Cloud Palaces. A moment later a gleam of sunshine flooded the
mountain and a gorgeous Rainbow appeared.

With a cry of gladness Polychrome sprang upon a point of rock and held
out her arms. Straightway the Rainbow descended until its end was at
her very feet, when with a graceful leap she sprang upon it and was at
once clasped in the arms of her radiant sisters, the Daughters of the
Rainbow. But Polychrome released herself to lean over the edge of the
glowing arch and nod, and smile and throw a dozen kisses to her late
comrades.

"Good-bye!" she called, and they all shouted "Good-bye!" in return and
waved their hands to their pretty friend.

Slowly the magnificent bow lifted and melted into the sky, until the
eyes of the earnest watchers saw only fleecy clouds flitting across the
blue.

"I'm dreadful sorry to see Polychrome go," said Betsy, who felt like
crying; "but I s'pose she'll be a good deal happier with her sisters in
the sky palaces."

"To be sure," returned Shaggy, nodding gravely. "It's her home, you
know, and those poor wanderers who, like ourselves, have no home, can
realize what that means to her."

"Once," said Betsy, "I, too, had a home. Now, I've only--only--dear old
Hank!"

She twined her arms around her shaggy friend who was not human, and he
said: "Hee-haw!" in a tone that showed he understood her mood. And the
shaggy friend who was human stroked the child's head tenderly and said:
"You're wrong about that, Betsy, dear. I will never desert you."

"Nor I!" exclaimed Shaggy's brother, in earnest tones.

The little girl looked up at them gratefully, and her eyes smiled
through their tears.

"All right," she said. "It's raining again, so let's go back into the
cavern